Chapter 6 - The Father Behind the Empire
Richard Vance arrived at the hospital the following morning carrying no flowers.
That alone made him more honest than his son.
He wore a charcoal overcoat and walked with a silver-handled cane he did not medically require but seemed to enjoy carrying.
Security stopped him outside my room.
He requested five minutes.
Maya said no.
Detective Grant said yes.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because people who think they’re smarter than everyone else often become useful when they talk.”
So Richard entered.
Grant remained behind the partially open bathroom door.
A recorder ran beneath my blanket.
Richard looked older than he had at my wedding.
Not weaker.
Just less interested in pretending to be kind.
“Nora.”
“Richard.”
His gaze moved toward my abdomen.
“I heard about the babies.”
“Don’t.”
He nodded.
“Fair.”
He took the visitor’s chair.
“For what it’s worth, I never wanted Julian to hurt you.”
“That’s worth nothing.”
“I expected better judgment from him.”
“He stabbed me twice.”
“I know.”
“You make it sound like he made a poor investment.”
Richard sighed.
“You always were sharp.”
“You always were a liar.”
That earned the faintest smile.
“Also fair.”
I wanted to throw something at him.
Instead, I waited.
Men like Richard hated silence.
Eventually he filled it.
“Julian is emotional. Always has been. Selena knows how to use that.”
“You knew about them.”
“Yes.”
“Before I married him.”
“Yes.”
“Did Julian meet me because of Crown Meridian?”
Richard considered lying.
Then apparently decided I already knew too much.
“Yes.”
My throat tightened anyway.
“Was any of it real?”
“I can’t answer that.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“I’m not my son.”
“No. You just built him.”
His eyes sharpened.
“You think children are that simple?”
“I think men become very predictable when no one ever tells them no.”
He stood.
“Be careful, Nora.”
“Is that a threat?”
“Advice.”
“From the man whose voice is on Marcus’s recording?”
For the first time, Richard froze.
Only briefly.
But enough.
I smiled.
“You didn’t know about that.”
He recovered quickly.
“I don’t know what you’re referring to.”
“Yes, you do.”
He walked toward the door.
“Marcus has always been weak.”
“Where is he?”
Richard stopped.
“I assumed the police would ask you.”
“He disappeared after warning me about you.”
Richard turned.
Something unexpected crossed his face.
Concern.
Real concern.
“If Marcus contacted you, tell Detective Grant to locate a woman named Evelyn Shaw.”
“Who is she?”
“My former chief counsel.”
“Why?”
“Because if Marcus believed he was in danger, that is where he would go.”
Then he left.
Grant emerged.
“Was that genuine?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s something.”
Evelyn Shaw lived in Connecticut.
Police arrived at her home two hours later.
Marcus was there.
Alive.
He had gone voluntarily.
His phone was off because he believed Vance corporate security could track him.
By evening, he was sitting beside my bed with a police officer outside.
He looked exhausted.
“I’m sorry.”
“Everyone keeps saying that.”
“I mean for disappearing.”
“Why didn’t you tell the police?”
“Because I didn’t know which officers my father had relationships with.”
Grant, standing near the window, looked unimpressed.
“Comforting.”
Marcus rubbed his eyes.
“I panicked.”
“What do you know?” I asked.
He stared at me.
“My father created Crown Meridian.”
There it was.
“He used it to move money?”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“Insurance fraud. Procurement kickbacks. Political consulting. Whatever needed distance from the Vance name.”
“Julian knew?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Since college.”
I felt something die inside me again.
Not love.
That was already gone.
Maybe the final fantasy that Julian had once been decent.
“Selena?”
Marcus hesitated.
“Selena’s father worked for us.”
“What did he do?”
“Security.”
“Corporate?”
“Sometimes.”
The way he said sometimes made Grant step forward.
“Explain.”
Marcus looked ashamed.
“My father used him to solve problems.”
“What kind?”
“The kind you don’t put in emails.”
I looked at him.
“Did he hurt people?”
“I don’t know.”
“You know enough.”
Marcus nodded.
“Yes.”
“And Selena?”
“Her father died when she was seventeen. My father paid for her education. She grew up around our family.”
“So she wasn’t some ex-girlfriend who randomly came back.”
“No.”
“She was always connected.”
“Yes.”
“Why did Julian tell me otherwise?”
“Because you weren’t supposed to know.”
I remembered Selena at charity dinners.
Always introduced as a donor.
Consultant.
Old family friend.
The truth had been standing beside me in evening gowns for years.
“Why did she help frame me?”
Marcus shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do.”
“Nora—”
“Tell me.”
He looked at the floor.
“There was life insurance.”
Maya stiffened.
“How much?”
“Fifty million.”
I stared.
“I don’t have a fifty-million-dollar life insurance policy.”
“You do.”
“No.”
“Julian took it out through a corporate executive family protection program.”
“He insured me without telling me?”
“He disclosed it inside a packet of benefits documents.”
The papers I had signed because Julian said they were standard.
“Beneficiary?”
“Julian.”
Of course.
But Marcus wasn’t finished.
“If Julian was unable to collect…”
He looked toward me.
“The beneficiary was the Vance Family Foundation.”
The charity controlled by Richard.
And Selena.
Suddenly everyone benefited from me dying.
My husband.
My father-in-law.
His mistress.
Maybe even the company.
I looked at Grant.
“You need to freeze that policy.”
“We will.”
Marcus leaned forward.
“There’s something else.”
I almost laughed.
“Of course there is.”
He pulled a folded paper from inside his jacket.
“I took this before I left the office.”
It was an internal memo.
A corporate restructuring plan.
Dated three weeks before the stabbing.
Under proposed leadership transition, one sentence had been highlighted.
Upon triggering event involving J.V. family circumstances, Selena Cole to assume temporary control of Vance Foundation voting shares.
Maya read it twice.
“Triggering event?”
Marcus nodded.
“Your death.”
The room went silent.
Selena wasn’t helping Julian escape his marriage.
She had positioned herself to gain control of part of his empire after he killed me.
And suddenly I understood something Julian had not.
May you like
His mistress had not manipulated him because she loved him.
She had been using him too.
